Improvement in furnaces for producing malleable iron



0. a. NASH. Furnaces for Producing Malleahle Iron. 142,716.

Patented SeptemberQ UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

DAVID ,R. NASH, OF BROOKLYN, E. D., NEW YORK.

IMPROVEMENT IN FURNACESFOR PRODUCING MALLEABLE IRON.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 142,716, dated September 9,1873; application filed March 11, 1873.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, DAVID R. NASH, of the city of Brooklyn, E. D., in the county of Kings, in the State of New York, have invented a certain new and useful Improvement in Furnaces for Deoxidizin g Ores, and for converting the same into malleable iron,when used in connection with puddling-furnaces 5 and I do hereby declare that the following is a description of the same, sufficiently clear and exact to enable a person skilled in the art to construct the same.

Figure 1 is a vertical section on the line A B of Fig. 3, showing the construction of parts of the furnace, and also its arrangement with reference to puddling-furnaces. Fig. 2 is a plan view, a portion of the top plate being broken away for the purpose of showing a section on line 1 2 of Fig. 1. Fig. 3 is a horizontal section on line 3 4 of Fig. 1.

Corresponding letters designate corresponding parts in the same figures.

This invention relates to that class of furnaces which are designed to be used for the purpose of deoxidizing ores from which iron and steel are made; and it consistsin the construction, combination, and arrangement of some of its parts, as will be more fully explained hereinafter.

In constructing this style of furnace I use a hearth, a a, of cast-iron or other suitable material, said hearth being supported jointly by the rear walls of the puddling-furnace and upon cast-iron columns, its outer walls or shell being built of brick, and of the same octagonal form as that of the hearth, it being provided with a lining of fire-bricks, or any other refractin g material, and bound together with suitable clamps. The walls of the furnace are diminished in thickness at the proper distance above the hearth,as shown in Fig. 1, the offset thus formed answering as a seat for the brackets which support the galleries, and they are pierced at proper intervals, near the hearth, with openings at m, which communicate with the retorts K K for the deoxidized ore. These retorts consist of separately-removable chambers, of substantially the form shown in Figs. 1 and 3, their inner and outer walls being concentric with the walls of the shell, thus forming, by their interior surfaces,

a receiving-chamber, d, which communicates directly with the fines of the paddling-furnace below through the induction-passage 6, their exterior surfaces being surrounded by the heated gases which pass up through the fluespace h h, which is extended upward the entire length of the furnace, the connection between the receiving-chamber d and the fluespace h h being effected by the connecting-fines z' i, beneath the retorts. In therdrawin g here: with presented there are represented sixteen, but there may be more orless, according to the capacity which it is desired to give to the furnace; and it will be seen that by making each one separate from andindependent of the other a very decided advantage is gained, as in the event of any one of them becoming so fire injured by use or accident as to require removal, it can be removed and replaced without interfering with any of the others, they being quadrangular in form, and made by the inventor by suitable tile between the inner and outer walls of the furnace, which rest directly upon the bridge-plates c c, which form the top of the connecting-flues it running beneath the same, the space .11 c being left between the walls of the retorts and opening into exterior flue-space 71/ it, thus allowing a free circulation of the heated gas between the same. These spaces are carried up to a, where they are cut off by tile coverings, forming the bottoms of return-fines is k which lead to the stack. The exterior flue-space h h and the return-fines k k are inclosed at the top by a covering of fire-brick, and the whole is surmounted by a castiron plate, 15 t, to which the brackets for sustaining the gallery are attached. The plate t t is pierced with openings a u, of such a size as to conveniently admit changing the retorts. These openings also serve as an outlet for the carbonic acid and moisture expelled by the action of the heat. The flanges x m and y y, upon the top of the plate 12 t, serve, respectively, to retain the stack in position, and to form a receiver for the ores for charging the retorts. At the angles of the flanges y circular bosses are placed for securing the standards which sustain a circular sling for deliverin the ores above the retorts; but, as itis imtintcndeil to embrace this hoisting apparatus in my claim, a

- the draft.

The operation of the furnace may be briefly stated as follows: The ores being introduced into the retorts with the proper percentage of carbon, and subjected to the action of a red heat for the required period of time, results in the expulsion of such carbonic acid and moisture as they may contain. The gangue of the ore absorbs a portion of the oxide of the metal, ,forming a fusible double silicate of alumina and protoxide of iron, reducing the mass to an amorphous state, in which it is readily drawn off through the openings m m into the chute s s, leading to the receiver over the puddling-furnace, from whence it is introduced to the puddling-hearth through the opening 2, as may be required. The gases, upon being introduced into the receiving chamber 01 through the induction-passage e, impinge on the deflector, which should be so adjusted as to produce the last result, and will be by it deflected along the inner walls of the retorts toward the hearth, and from thence through the connecting-fines 1; i beneath the retorts into the interior flue-space h h, at the same time circulating between the retorts through the space v v, and finally through the flues K K to the stack and out into the atmosphere.

Having thus described my invention, what I'elaim, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is-

1. In a furnace for deoxidizing ores, the combination of a series of separately-removable retorts arranged around a common center, fines for conducting the heated gases from a puddling-furnace, or from puddling or heating furnaces, to and around the retorts, substantially as and for the purpose set forth.

2. The combination of the separately-removable retorts K K and the chutes s for conducting the deoxidized ore to the puddling-furnaces, substantially as setforth.

3. The combination of the central inductionpassage 0, receiving chamber 61 and deflector g, arranged substantially as and for the purpose set forth.

4:. The combination and arrangement of the receiving-chamber d, induction-passage a, conmeeting-lines i z, fines or spaces 7: v, flue-space h h, and return-tines 7c 70, substantially as and for the purpose set forth.

DAVID R. NASH.

Witnesses F. B. J ENNEY, BEN B. FRENCH. 

